PERRYVILLE HIGH SCHOOL PLAN DOUBTFUL; NEW SCHOOL APPEARS TO BE TOO COSTLY, OFFICIALS SAY

PERRYVILLE -- Perry County School District board members agree a new high school is too costly a proposition to take to voters, and board members are considering a plan to build a new upper-elementary school to ease crowding.

But nothing has been decided, said Dennis Martin, school board president.

"We still have a lot of work to do before a decision is made on when we would put something on the ballot," he said.

Dr. Rex Miller, superintendent of schools, said the new high school would have cost almost $15 million.

Construction costs plus operating levy increases for higher salaries and building maintenance would have meant asking for a levy increase of more than $4 per $100 assessed valuation.

That is asking too much, Miller and Martin said.

"We didn't feel like that was a reasonable request," Martin said.

"Taxes are a burden. We have to be realistic," Miller said.

So board members asked architect David Kromm to come up with another less-costly solution to the district's building needs.

Kromm's solution is a new elementary school to house grades 3 and 4 and possibly grade 5 as well.

He is working on the plans now.

Miller put the estimated cost for the elementary school at "more than $5 million."

School officials are going to have to decide where to put the fifth-graders, he said.

"Right now we have our fifth-graders in a metal building behind the middle school," he said.

Miller said the building is functional, "but there are no windows and the roof leaks."

School board members are trying to be practical.

"It's a shorter-term solution than the high school would have been, but while the high school is a longer-term solution, it's also a more expensive solution. We've looked at something that will solve the problems for a shorter period, but the shorter-term solution costs you less," Martin said.

Most of the district's enrollment growth is in the elementary grades, but the increase in the number of students isn't the real problem, Miller said. The problem is the addition of new programs that are gobbling up classrooms, he said.

Schools have seen "tremendous growth" in special education, early childhood programs, Parents As Teachers and other programs that need classrooms of their own, Miller said.

"Five years ago we didn't have early childhood education," he said.

And technology labs also need their own space. Every time a computer lab is set up, he said, "that pulls a classroom away from general use."

A high school teacher has applied for a grant to set up an interactive television classroom, Miller said. "Now we're wondering, if we get the grant, where are we going to put it?"

Classroom space isn't the only issue the board has to worry about, Martin said. The school board also wants to increase teachers' pay to make Perry County's salary schedule more competitive with other area schools. And maintenance of existing buildings is a big financial concern, he said.

"We heard very clearly from the long-range planning committee that they wanted a package that addresses the maintenance issue, the salary issue and the facilities issue," Martin said.

School board members continue meeting with the architect "to look at exactly what our options are," he said, and nothing has been set in stone yet.